Breathing
by Crystalemi
Summary: Naruto could remember stunningly well the moment he had started to breathe better. When he'd got Sasuke out of jail and Sasuke's eyes had landed on him for the longest bunch of seconds of his life, in that exact moment all the air he had missed for years had come back to him in a painful new first breath. NOT spoilers free! & SasuNaru.


Hi, I'm Will and this is the first story I'm posting on here :D

It's SasuNaru/NaruSasu and I wrote it for the weekly prompt challenge (here) with the prompt "I'd Come for You".

There are **spoilers** of the latest chapters (I believe 627?) so please beware, they are major spoilers (if you actually see them) ~

**Warnings**: Unbeta'd and English is not my first language. A (pretty random) time-skip.

Now, please, enjoy ~

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**Breathing**

It was darker that night, Naruto noticed looking briefly to the sky, where there were no stars and no moon. And it was cold, and that kind of temperature always made him think of Sasuke, something he lately tried to avoid. He had other things on his mind, Sasuke had to wait for him to straighten the world and then he'd be able to hunt him down like the good dog Naruto felt he was becoming.

But as every time someone tries to push something aside to concentrate on some other more pressing matter, the presence in his mind of the avoided issue strengthened and instead of keeping quiet, it seemed it started to scream for attention at the top of its metaphorical lungs.

The night was beautiful, Naruto decided, while he sat down, unwillingly ready to contemplate the issue that he had so strongly put aside. But it was Sasuke the issue, and Sasuke wasn't the kind of person you can just ignore.

Well, at least not if your name is Naruto.

Counting up the years quickly, the lonely ninja realized it had been around two years and a half since the chuunin examination. Two years and a half of Sasuke missing from Konoha. Two years and a half of Naruto missing Sasuke madly.

Sometimes, when it was night and Naruto was alone he could feel clearly the extent of his feelings for that bastard who was stubbornly trying to break his heart, quite literally too.

Naruto would feel the air clogging up his throat and a huge void opening in his chest, leaving him numb and on the brink of asphyxiation. Sasuke was his air, and it didn't matter how much Naruto could hold his breath, he _needed_ that damn air, he needed Sasuke taunting him, starting their arguments, driving him mad just being the perfect heartless bastard he was.

«What are you doing here?»

Naruto jumped a mile, scared out of his socks, but Sakura just giggled and sat down next to him. Naruto stared at her for a while, guessing in the dark her petite features, picturing in his mind how pretty she was and how much not in love he was anymore. Sometimes he wished with all his mind that he could still be in love with her, but his heart would hear no reasoning.

If he thought of relationships, he just saw them like little petty things that could never compare to the amount of feelings he had for Sasuke. Not that he liked Sasuke _that way_, but nothing could compare to what they shared. How could he tell a woman he loved her while his mind was only focused on Sasuke? How could he promise someone he'd cherish them forever while they couldn't cure the void and air lack Sasuke's left behind?

«Hey, Naruto, I'm talking to you!»

The punch on his shoulder brought him back to reality and he smiled even though he knew Sakura couldn't see him in the dark.

«I couldn't sleep.» he admitted shyly, not really knowing how to tell her what was on his mind without hurting Sakura. Between them the Sasuke-issue was now mostly forbidden. He could understand Sakura's worrying for him, he could even try and understand why she had given up on Sasuke. It wasn't so hard, really.

But he couldn't do the same just because everyone else had given up. He just couldn't decide to stop breathing forever.

«Neither could I.» Sakura said, leaning down to lay her head on Naruto's shoulder. He didn't care, too engrossed in his thoughts. Did he thought out loud and was Sakura saying she couldn't breathe without Sasuke too?

«Tomorrow it's going to snow.» she added in, but Naruto only shrugged with his free shoulder. Snow made him think of Sasuke too, of how the cold would redden his cheeks cutely, of how he'd look flustered while still wearing his usual annoyed expression. Naruto remembered how much Sasuke seemed to despise the cold and feel it more than anyone else.

«I was thinking of how cute we were when we were kids.» Naruto told Sakura out loud, for a moment holding his breath in fear she would think of Sasuke and become sad and angry, but Sakura laughed and nodded on his shoulder and then she started recounting stupid missions without any meaning, adding in bit and pieces of how cool it was not to care about peace because it was something given, not something they had to fight for.

She even praised Sasuke's beauty like she'd do had he been just down the hill, sleeping in his bag, as if he'd never gone away in the first place. Naruto silently appreciated her efforts to stay positive for him and how she described Sasuke too. It was refreshing hearing her talk of petty things like Sasuke's skin, or hands or his hair.

They stayed up until dawn, when the first little snowflakes started coming down and only then sleep rang at their doors and they crawled in their sleeping bags to sleep those hour or so they still had.

Naruto that night was able to breathe for a moment.

It was a bright night, and even without all the artificial lights around him Naruto could have counted all the shades of black and grey in Sasuke's eyes. They were sitting outside this little cozy café, drinking black tea and cappuccino. People came and went, chattering and laughing, making Naruto happy. He loved hearing people express their happiness. Sometimes someone stopped to say hi to him and Naruto would keep it extremely brief, in order not to upset Sasuke.

Between them, there was only silence. A silence full of untold secrets that burnt both of them, and that were to be brought up and left in the open that same night.

As always, Naruto had pursued Sasuke out of his new apartment. After Sasuke had spent a couple years in jail for what he had done, the Hokage had given him an empty apartment to live in. And live Sasuke had done. He had decorated the place at first. Without being able to use his chakra, Sasuke had started making furniture and Naruto kind of hoped he sucked big time at that, but Sasuke was great and had this style sense that made him get a surprisingly cozy and elegant apartment. Then he decided to learn how to sew, and _ça va sans dire_, he was great at that too.

Naruto had bought him supplies, because he couldn't be there to annoy the hell out of Sasuke while he worked. Naruto's new job took all of his time, but at least he could stay in Konoha without having to deal with long missions and life threatening situations. He needed to stay near Sasuke. It was a physical need, and Naruto had always seconded his physical needs.

Now Sasuke was able to use his chakra again, and he did for every little thing. He needed to go somewhere? He'd walk on the roofs. He needed to light up the fireplace? He'd use a fire jutsu.

It would look silly, if only Naruto didn't sympathize with the guy. He could sense Sasuke's happiness at being able to breathe again. Naruto could remember stunningly well the moment he had started to breathe better. When he got Sasuke out of jail and Sasuke's eyes had landed on him for the longest bunch of seconds of all his life, in that _exact_ moment all the air he had missed for years had come back to him in a painful new first breath.

Inside, Naruto had cried like a new born baby being forced to take his very first breath. He had wanted to hug Sasuke to hell and back, but restrained because he wasn't just Naruto seeing his long time lost _soul mate_, but he was the Hokage, relieving Uchiha Sasuke of all his charges.

After years, almost five, they were sitting quietly in a café, Sasuke finally going to accept Naruto back in his life, talking things through, for a change.

After one blond kunoichi stalled for a bit too long in their presence, making things up to chat with Naruto, while briefly looking now and again at Sasuke, they silently decided it was the right moment to get up and take a walk.

Sasuke had almost thrown a fit when he had returned to Konoha to find out the old Uchiha compound hadn't been rebuilt but actually turned into training and playing grounds. Konoha had paid him what the elders thought the compound was worth – a misery in Naruto's opinion – and Sasuke had sulked for months, driving Sakura mad with worry.

At the time, Naruto still couldn't go near Sasuke without him trying to burn his ass, quite literally. That had been the saddest season of Naruto life, and he was happy they were through with that shit.

«I heard Sakura is expecting.» Naruto threw out the first thing he could think of, and that was the decision Sasuke had made to rebuild his clan.

«Shino's.» Sasuke replied with a shrug. Naruto went red and stopped in his track, in the middle of the playing ground built on Sasuke's old compound ruins.

«Oh, I thought-»

«That's new.» Sasuke interrupted him, casting a half smirk his way. After a few seconds of him staring a Sasuke, his mouth comically open wide and his eyes the size of balloons, Naruto erupted in a stream of insults, just like when they were kids, embarrassment and rage clouding his mind.

«Shut up, Usuratonkachi.» told him Sasuke and Naruto stupidly listened to him. He finally realized Sasuke was trying to lighten up the mood, while Naruto hadn't even noticed the silence had become a tense one.

Naruto sighed and relaxed. He looked around for a bench and founding none he noted to himself to have someone adding a couple more in that area of the park. As it was, he leant down against a tree. Sasuke followed him but decided to stand right in front of him, his half smirk long gone.

«We need to talk, I suppose.» Naruto stated, not looking at Sasuke. Somehow he just wished they didn't need to, but he knew they'd go nowhere without starting anew. Five years were already gone, and Naruto didn't want to waste any more time.

«What do you want from me, Dobe?» asked Sasuke and Naruto, reacting to the insult, looked back at him. Sasuke's eyes pinned Naruto down, making him shiver with their intensity.

But he couldn't let this one go. He had already procrastinated for too long.

«Stop calling me names. I'm trying to be serious here, and you're not helping.» he stalled again, too scared of those words he had waiting on the point of his tongue that begged him to get out and make it all better or completely destroy everything. And he was afraid of letting them go.

«Why would I?» Sasuke replied and Naruto just had to count up to ten or he'd punched the bastard square in the face.

«Because I care for you and I'm asking you to start all over again. We can't go on like this forever.» he said, wishing he had gone for his true thoughts the minute Sasuke's beautiful thin lips turned into a cruel smirk.

«What if I don't want to?» He tauntingly asked. At that point not even counting to one hundred could have saved Naruto from his own reaction.

«I don't care what _you_ want! I need to know why the fuck you came back on your own and avoided me for five fucking years! I've been there for you all the time, but you never acknowledged me, I've hunt you down before you came back, I begged you to come the fuck home but you were too much of a prissy bastard to fucking accept you couldn't change the past! And I've been there for you all the fucking time!» he was painting with the effort of not strike and punch Sasuke, who already looked livid without any physical blow. When Naruto saw that Sasuke was going to reply he added:

«And I've been loving you for years. I've begged on my knees a lot of people for you, I _lied_ for you, I would have killed for you. You know I still would.»

Sasuke was looking at him, with an expression that was totally new to Naruto, but had something to do with mild disgust, which Naruto found he probably deserved, what with falling for his best friend and everything.

«But I don't care about what I did, I'd do it again.» he went on. «the point is that I'll always come for you, but you won't.»

Naruto realized his legs were as heavy as blocks of lead. The cat was out of the bag, but it didn't make him feel any lighter. Admitting that everything he'd felt up to then was only in his mind, was just about killing him. Naruto didn't know if there was any physical pain that could top what he was feeling right then, but he needed to let Sasuke go, and he needed to hear the words from Sasuke, or he'd live his whole life in regret, always wondering what could've been if he had just _asked_ Sasuke.

«You're so dumb.» Sasuke spat out with so much rage that Naruto was pretty sure by the end of their conversation both of them would be admitted to hospital with life threatening wounds.

Not too unexpectedly Sasuke struck first, hitting Naruto in his plexus, leaving him breathless. He didn't let him curl up around his mid-section: he pressed his body against the other's, his arm pressing under Naruto's chin, slightly choking him.

«You know what they say, don't you, Naruto?» Sasuke breathed straight into Naruto's right ear. Naruto looked at him mildly surprised by the gentleness Sasuke was using to handle him. He was breathless, but only the pain from the first punch was registering, meaning Sasuke was not really choking him (or it may have meant that the first punch was really something and Naruto was now delirious).

«They say that when two Shinobi are powerful enough, they read each other's thoughts, simply through an exchange of fists, without ever uttering a single word.» he mumbled, his lips curling gently against Naruto's ear, and the blond ninja felt his legs give up on him and, wasn't it for Sasuke's arm, he'd be tumbling on the ground.

The pain was slowly subsiding, but he felt as if he was drunk on it, he couldn't clear his mind, he could only hear Sasuke's words and feel those beautiful lips move bare millimeters away from his ear shell.

«Tell me, do you know what's on my mind?» he finished shocking Naruto out of his skin, placing a feather-like kiss where his jaw met his earlobe.

He didn't let him go, then, he just put a bit of space between them, to be able to look into his eyes. Naruto couldn't understand what was going on, even though the pain was almost forgettable now and his legs were able to hold him up. He briefly noticed Sasuke was still taller than him, but he quickly put that thought aside to concentrate on the matter at hand.

He raised his eyes and bore them into Sasuke's, he wasn't just pissed out, Naruto was downright mad. Not only did Sasuke act like the madman he was, he demanded Naruto played along with his little riddles and stupid requests of his, like learning to read freaking minds. That was Sasuke's job by the way!

«You, idiot. You can't really tell, can you?» Sasuke asked, befuddled by the sincerity of Naruto's unspoken reply. He just smiled wickedly.

«You want me to tell you?» he asked again and this time Naruto's hands grabbed the arm that was still pressed against his throat and snarled.

«You owe me, bastard!»

«Okay, then. If you say so. It doesn't matter why I came back, it was the right thing to do in the end. But do you really believe I just avoided you? If I wanted to get rid of you I'd found a way. I needed to heal, you demented shithead. I needed time to be by myself and fucking _heal_.»

He said, letting Naruto go.

Naruto looked at him, so much hurt in his bright blue eyes that it almost made Sasuke's heart sink. He didn't want to hurt Naruto any more than what had been necessary.

«You let Sakura in. You let Kakashi back in. You let _everyone_ back into your life. Everyone _but me_.» Naruto bit back, his eyes shifted and ended up looking at the dirty ground.

Sasuke found himself at a loss for words. Didn't Naruto understand why he had to be the last one? Was it that hard to understand that Naruto was simply too much to just let him _silently_ slip back into the place he filled before? Did that place still exist, anyway?

«Dobe, didn't I come for you? To the war, I came for you.» He reluctantly admitted.

Naruto looked up at him but felt his heart burst with what he knew was the truth.

«You didn't. You came for Itachi, not for me.»

Again, Sasuke found himself with no words to counter. He was losing this battle, and he knew it was the most important in their whole personal war.

«Alright, I might have done it for Itachi at the time, but he's dead! Today I'd come _for you_! And I _stayed_ for you! I fucking hate Konoha but here I am, playing along with a village of hypocrites only because you're here!»

Naruto slowly looked up again, and Sasuke realized he hadn't just won that battle, he had won the _war_. He was the ultimate winner, from that moment onward they'd just fight because it was them and they understood each other through sweat and punches, but then, that night, he had won the war.

A wave of relief washed over him as Naruto's eyes became darker and calculating, he was probably slowly understanding all the pain Sasuke had been through, putting up with Konoha's shit all his life and especially those last five years, since he had played the part of the nice repented guy, while inside he still saw Konoha as the place full of people who had made his brother slaughter his whole family.

«But why not me?» Naruto whined, scared of letting the happiness inside.

«Because it's _you_.» Sasuke replied, looking for the right words to describe what had gone inside his mind for five and maybe unconsciously even more, years.

«We can't go back Naruto, we can only go forward.» he said, hoping the idiot had actually gone back to trusting what he knew was inside Sasuke's mind – because Sasuke was sure Naruto was still able to read him better than anyone else.

«Where?» Naruto asked again, letting Sasuke know just how deep the emotional wound he himself had carved through the years was. A Naruto that didn't want to trust a friend was a seriously wounded Naruto. Sasuke sometimes still wanted to kick his ass for doing something so cruel to the only person that had wanted to go beyond appearances and be his friend.

«Home?» he tentatively replied and Naruto thought about it for a bit, because he wanted to trust Sasuke, he just didn't trust his luck. Wasn't it too easy? Sasuke actually wanting to have some sort of awkward friendship with him?

And then it came to him. He didn't want an awkward friendship. He was past the notion of friendship. He wanted to own Sasuke and wanted Sasuke to own him. He wanted people to know they were both off-limits, he wanted the damn blond kunoichi in the café to know that Sasuke didn't want her with just a look at _Naruto_.

«Can we _date_?» Naruto asked out loud surprising Sasuke with the sheer intensity of the emotions in his bright blue eyes. Sasuke felt them pierce his soul and he believed he was doing the right thing with his life for the third time in his life. He knew just looking in those eyes that he was taking the right decision.

«Sure.» he shrugged.

From that night to the one of his death, Naruto was able to breathe just fine.

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Hope you enjoyed!

Now please, feed the writer and review?


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